Monday, May 27, 2013

We are taking a short trip this week and I thought I would have to wait until I came home to do this fortnight's letter for the Craft Barn Challenge but I found a word and the juices started flowing . The word I chose is "Firmament" and in my old dictionary it is explained as "the sky viewed, originally a a solid expanse with stars fixed in it: the region of the air."
I was inspires by these two images I found

There are mancoloured versions of the sencond picture so here is mine

The stars are actually gold metal not black and they shine. I painted the background with watercolours for a change, the village is made up from images stamped onto card, painted and collaged. I am sorry I can't name designer but they are unmounted and I have had them for years. The sun is made from a a brayer clean off sheet from a gelli session. The angels are punched out of another gelli sheet as are the letters die cut with a Tim Holtz alphabet.The thing I like best about this page is, it has used things I have had for years. Here it is with it's tag.

Saturday, May 25, 2013

Yesterday it poured, all day, but I had been invited to the workshop of a new musical so I boarded the bus and went to a part of London I had never been before. I made it to The Hackney Empire in spite of the fact that the bus windows were completely opaque with condensation. The musical is called "The Silver Sword" and is based on this book which I somehow missed out reading. I do hope it makes it to the big stage because even in workshop form I laughed and cried and I liked the music and would like to hear it again. Well worth the soaking.

Have you noticed, I have received a gold star for my "A" entry of the Craft Barn Alphabet Challenge. Very pleased.

We are going north for a week so I will have to contain my impatience at trying out this technique from Gelli Arts.

Thursday, May 23, 2013

A friend found this on You Tube, a different view of a city I love. I particulary like the poiceman on point duty. Remember?

Her find fitted in nicely with a little book I have just finished. I used the black cards which come with DH's postage stamps which he collects. I am quite cross because I have just rid myself of a pile of these cards because I thought I didn't have a use for them. Typical. The ATC are cut from a cereal packet with my Sizzix and then decotated with flower prints.

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

another trip down memory lane with this fortnight's Craft Barn Alphabet Challenge. There are some really obscure words beginning with K. I toyed with "kinetic" because I love kinetic sculpture but it is a bit difficult to interprate on paper. Then my eye fell on "kaleidoscope". We had one when I was a child and it gave me hours of fascination. Looking at the little bits of foil through the glass at the bottom and then marvelling at the patterns when you looked through the other end. They seem to be mainly round these days but ours was triangular. If you are tempted there are instructions for making one here
So here is my take on "Kaleidoscope"

First I made some gelli prints on thin card and cut six equilateral triangles(Mr Craven would have been proud of me). I attached them with an eyelet, ensuring they would spin. I made a weathered wood background.

Here it is with the definition tag.

and this is a Paint Shop Pro digital kaleidoscope of the second picture

Thank you if you left a comment last time, I did try to visit everyone and there are some great ideas out there. So fascinating to see the coice of words.
Small rant....Is anyone else becoming exasperated with the increasing "predictive text" on search engines and such. I know what I want to say and the machine, clever though it is, does not. End of rant. Thank you.

Monday, May 06, 2013

The Big Road Trip moves on. We visited this state on our first trip to America and it hold some of the happiest memories. Remember this?
Well we found they really are blue.

Our destination for the evening was supposed to be the town of Roanoke but we stopped in for a coffee, at the Peaks of Otter Lodge , we oouldn't resist the ice cream and ended up staying the night We had a wonderful meal and stopped up late talking to some of the people who lived locally but came up to the hills for the weekend.
On the way down, and quite be accident we came across the Pat Buckley Moss Museum, I fell in love with her people and her snowy landscapes.

We were allowed to take photographs in the gallery but this may not be the case, I will remove if it breaches copyright. You can see many other paintings here (Google Images)

I bought an embroidery kit and this has hung in my living room ever since.

We returned to Virginia on the last full day of our trip and spent it in Colonial Williamsburg. What a fascinating day that was, a real step back in time, we watched a house being built with only the tools that would have been available in the 18th century and of course we voted againt Independance. My most abiding memory is the sound of a pipe and drum band fading away into the evening, a poignant ending to what had been a wonderful trip. It still brings a tear.
Thank you Marit for evoking some really wonderful memories. Here is something I made a while back but I realise now where I, probably, found the inspiration.

Wednesday, May 01, 2013

My letter A for the Craft Barn Alphabet challenge. My first thought was, of course, Alphabet but I am hoping to make a book of this challenge, if I get to the end, and I have an idea for the cover firmly fixed in mind. So I had to find something different, I toyed with Astrology and Astronomy but then this lept out of the old dictionary.

I had never heard of this charm before. My triangle isn't exactly equilateral but geometry was never a strong suit.
I cut the letters from gold paper with my die cutter. I remembered, from childhood, those sliding panels that used to change the picture but couldn't find or figure out how to make one (if anyone knows please tell me)
so I made a rabbit which disappears (wrong way round I know but it had to be where it is).